Chancellor's Parashah Commentary

Rabbi Matthew Berkowitz is the rabbinic fellow at The Jewish Theological Seminary.

This week, we read the first of three "haftarot of rebuke" which precede Tisha
B'av. Even though this Haftorah is ordinarily associated with Mattot, Mattot is
read as the first half of a double–portion this year. We read this
haftorah a week "early" to be sure we don't miss it.

One of the most paradoxical and troubling narratives in Tanakh occurs at
the seam of Parashat Balak and Parashat Pinhas. Having been seduced by
Moabite women in Shittim, the Israelites turn to the worship of the
Moabite god, Baal Peor. God commands Moses to slay all of the Israelite
leaders who led the people astray; Moses then orders his deputies to
kill all those who "attached themselves" to Baal Peor. At that moment,
an Israelite man and Moabite woman profanely flaunt their relationship
before Moses and the whole Israelite community. Pinhas, the grandson of
Aaron, takes a spear, follows them into their chamber, and kills them
both in the middle of their sexual act.

As a reward for Pinhas' deed, God puts an end to the plague by which he
had punished the Israelites for their behavior and even more shockingly,
Pinhas is granted a "covenant of peace" for his act. God declares:
"Pinhas... has turned back My wrath from the Israelites by displaying
among them his passion for Me. Say therefore, 'I grant him My covenant
of peace. It shall be for him and his descendants after him a covenant
of priesthood for all time, because he took impassioned action for his
God, thus making expiation for the Israelites" (Numbers 25:13). What
makes Pinhas' zealous and violent behavior deserving of a "covenant of
peace"?

Another episode of zealotry some forty years earlier sheds light on this
week's parasha. In Exodus 2:11–12, we read of Moses' maturation and
subsequent identification with the oppressed Israelites. Moses goes out
to his fellow Israelites. The text continues, "he saw their burdens.
And he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his kinsmen. He turned
this way and that and, seeing no one about, he struck down the Egyptian
and hid him in the sand." Commenting on the phrase, "he saw their
burdens," Rashi, the great medieval exegete writes, "he turned his eyes
and heart to their afflictions." It was not that Moses merely saw the
burden of the Israelite people; his act of seeing was far deeper.
Sight, for Moses, involved both his eyes and his heart. To see, for
Moses, was to feel the pain of the other. It was empathy, absolute
identification with the other that triggered Moses' zealotry. To be
silent is to be complacent. To be silent is to acquiesce in the face of
injustice. This does not excuse the taking of another's life.
Nevertheless, it is this act and Moses' keen sense of justice and
empathy that make him worthy of becoming the shepherd of the Israelites.

Such empathy plays a critical role in the Pinhas narrative as well. The
Israelites broke faith with God. By engaging in sexual relations with
the Moabites and attaching themselves to Baal Peor, they abandoned the
sacred covenant of loyalty and monotheism between God and themselves.
When the Ten Commandments were given at Mt. Sinai, the Israelites were
told that God is a jealous God, who expects absolute, categorical
commitment. However, the Israelites turned to the Golden Calf, sparking
the rage and jealousy of God; and now, the Israelites turn to Baal
Peor. To Pinhas' credit, he senses God's pain. It is this act of
identification with God that tempers God's jealousy. To be silent in
the face of the outrageous and profane behavior of the Israelites would
have been to acquiesce to their acts. Pinhas is empathetic. He places
himself in the shoes of the Other, in this case God, and acts on God's
behalf.

Although Professor Ze'ev Falk z"l is on the mark in writing that "the
connection between zealotry and peace is a paradox" (Falk, To the Very
End, 364), in light of the model of Moses and the role of empathy, it is
not difficult to understand how peace may follow from zealotry. The
zealotry of both Moses and Pinhas is a product of extreme empathy. For
Moses, empathy means placing one's self in the role of one's fellow
human being and feeling the physical and emotional pain experienced by
that individual under the whip of the oppressor. The Israelites see
Moses' empathy and begin relating to him as one of their own––not as
an Egyptian vizier. For Pinhas, empathy is more abstract and
difficult. Pinhas empathizes with God. Pinhas understands the sanctity
of covenant and is zealously willing to defend that sanctity. In light
of the continued disloyalties of the Israelites, Pinhas represents
steadfast loyalty to God's covenant. His empathy puts an end to
Israelite betrayal. God sees Pinhas' empathy which in turn puts an end
to the plague and leads to God's forgiveness. Empathy is a gateway to
forgiveness and to peace.

The parasha then becomes all the more relevant in light of the present
negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians at Camp David. My
hope is that empathy will drive these partners toward a real peace.
Only by acknowledging the other's perspective and version of their own
historical experience can they ever hope to move forward. May we all
declare resoundingly as the opening of Midrash Rabbah of this week's
parasha, "Great is peace, the gift made to Pinhas! For the world could
not be maintained except by peace, and the Torah is wholly peace; as it
says, The Torah's ways are ways of pleasantness and all her paths are
peace (Proverbs 3:17)."

Unlike Moses and Pinhas, our mandate must eschew violence. But let the
empathetic zealousness of Moses and Pinhas be our guide as we look
toward creating a brighter future.